


it'll hurt less, in the end

by colourbyletter



Category: WTFock | Skam (Belgium)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, Time Travel, and flashbacks, more italics than necessary, sander is kind of cool
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-04
Updated: 2020-02-04
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:40:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22551157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/colourbyletter/pseuds/colourbyletter
Summary: There is no way that Robbe can do all this another time. He can’t stand by and flirt with Sander, come out to the boys, hurt everyone that he possibly can, get his heart broken and fixed, all in the same sentence, and a million more things, because this time, he knows how it ends. It ends with Sander walking away from Robbe on a freezing February night, and it ends with Robbe alone, again.Will Sander love him in this universe? Will he even like him?or; the one where Robbe and Sander break up, and the universe gives them another shot.
Relationships: Sander Driesen/Robbe IJzermans
Comments: 13
Kudos: 97





	it'll hurt less, in the end

It’s the middle of the night, and it’s cold. Too cold. The kind of cold that burns from the inside out and leaves marks on pale skin that never really fade.

“Sander. Sander! Wait, _please,_ wait-”

Sander isn’t stopping. He’s walking away, _and he isn’t stopping,_ and Robbe feels as though his heart is going to break through his ribcage. He thinks he’s been chasing Sander for hours. It definitely seems that way.

“Sander, this isn’t fair,” he says. _“Fuck,_ we have to talk about this.”

Sander finally turns around and Robbe wants to run, run back to his flat, back in time _._ He’s never seen that look on Sander’s face before, not directed towards him. He’s seen numbness, shock, adoration, love _._ But not that look of anger, and hurt, and _disappointment._ It makes him sick.

“Do we?” Sander asks, only he isn’t asking. “Do we really have to talk about this? Because I think you’ve said _everything_ you can.”

He hasn’t tried to move again, so Robbe takes a step closer. And another. He’s crossing a bridge, and maybe, if he can get to the other side, he can hold onto just one more minute, one more day, one more _anything._ Maybe, maybe, maybe.

Sander is right in front of him. He’s right there, but he won’t look at Robbe. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry, okay?” He reaches for Sander’s hand, and something in Sander’s eyes changes. He lets Robbe take it, and their fingertips are just barely touching, but it scares the ice in the air away. “You hurt me too, though. You _did._ And you can’t just-”

Sander’s eyes go blank, and he pulls his hand away. The cold is back. Worse this time. “Leave me alone, Robbe,” he says. And then Sander is walking away. _Again._

“You promised!” Robbe yells. The wind bites at his face. He tries to tell himself that the water building up in his eyes is because of that sharp sting. “‘In every universe.’ You can’t take that back, Sander.”

There’s silence. And Robbe is staring up at the sky, flying between the stars, because he can’t, he _won’t_ look at Sander’s face when he says-

“Maybe I lied about this one.”

The words swirl along the wind and pierce Robbe’s heart, so sharp that he can’t breathe. He wants to yell, scream, cry, and _breathe, he needs to breathe._ He wants to tell Sander that it’s okay, that they don’t need to walk away, that this is not how this is supposed to end, not in this universe, not in _any_ universe.

But it’s too late. Because Sander is gone. And Robbe is frozen.

~~~

He’s floating.

He’s watching the world through a blurry camera lens. People smiling, people laughing, people crying, people screaming. It hurts and it doesn’t, it heals, and it doesn’t.

The camera changes. He doesn’t know to where, exactly. But everything is so beautiful. Colours that twirl and blend to make patterns on canvas, waves smashing against a sandy beach, the smell of forest right after it rains- it’s all so beautiful. He is everywhere and nowhere, all at the same time.

There’s someone laughing. It’s harsh, and cruel, and grating, until it’s not. And then they’re laughing with him, making him feel safe, wrapping him in warmth and light and he can’t remember what it was like to be cold.

But then the laughter cuts out, the warmth is gone, and he isn’t floating anymore.

He’s falling.

~~~

When Robbe wakes up, there’s someone two inches away from his face, and they most definitely are not supposed to be there.

“ _Jesus,_ Milan,” Robbe says. His pulse is running a marathon. “Do you not know how to knock?”

“I did. Five times.” Milan grins. “I was getting sick of listening to your _Backstreet Boys_ alarm. It’s cute, but not that cute.”

Robbe punches his phone. The song cuts out. “Fuck _off,”_ he says, rubbing his eyes.

Milan grins again. Robbe wants to scream. Or sleep. Or both.

“Hey Robbe,” Zoe says softly, stepping through his door. “How are you doing? Are you feeling okay?”

“Haven’t exactly got there yet,” Milan coughs.

“We heard that you guys broke up” Zoe says. “I’m really sorry.”

_We broke up? Who broke up?_

Robbe’s chest constricts. _Oh._

_Sander walking away, Sander not coming back, Robbe punching a tree, Robbe crying, Robbe wandering around the park until he could finally gather up enough sense to find his way back to the apartment, Robbe watching his bleeding knuckles stain his sheets red-_

Zoe is talking as if Robbe hadn’t just experienced getting the wind knocked out of him by only two words. “Noor came by yesterday, when you were still sleeping. To get some of her stuff. She said that you guys were going to stay friends though, although I didn’t know if that was _true,_ because last time Noor said that about the guy she was dating, they never spoke again,” Zoe continues, but Robbe is still stuck back on the word Noor. _Noor? Didn’t they break up five months ago?_

No. No way. No fucking way. There’s a idea that’s pushing at Robbe’s thoughts, and he doesn’t want to believe it, _no thank you._

He and Sander broke up yesterday. And even _thinking_ those words causes a rope to wrap around Robbe’s chest and pull. So it’s absolutely, positively _impossible_ that him and Noor broke up yesterday too, because that would mean-

“Uh, yeah, we’re staying friends,” Robbe interrupts. “But, um, I think I need some time. _Alone_ time. To process everything. So.” They stare at him blankly.

There’s a loud coughing noise from outside Robbe’s door that sounds suspiciously like _‘get out.’_

Milan jumps up. “Zoe and I have to go make lunch, but you’ll text us if you need anything, yeah?”

“Or I can walk out of my bedroom.”

“Or that.”

“But-” Zoe starts.

“Okay, bye!” Milan shrieks. He grabs Zoe by the wrist and yanks her out of the room, slamming the door behind him. Robbe can hear Senne’s _is he okay?_ followed by Zoe’s _ask him yourself,_ completed by a very loud _shut up!_ from Milan, and then, silence.

Robbe gives it approximately seven seconds of quiet before he dives across his bed to grab his phone, because there is _no way_ that he broke up with Noor yesterday, it’s not possible, that happened _months_ ago, right before he met Sander, because yesterday was February something, he can’t remember, and now, it’s-

October. It’s October. It’s fucking _October, and it’s 2019, and last time he checked the clock, wasn’t it February 2020?_

Robbe is going to pass out. He scrolls through his photos, social media, everything, but the most recent date on it is the one on his screen. There is no _fucking_ way it’s October. It’s February, and he knows that, because it was soon going to be his and Sander’s six-month anniversary, he had just circled it on the calendar that Sander had given him for Christmas, the one above his desk-

_Fuck. There is no calendar._

Okay. _Okay._ Maybe the boys were playing a joke on him? Maybe between stumbling around the park for an hour without a jacket, and curling into a ball underneath his covers to cry, someone had taken his phone and wiped everything. Someone had signed into every Instagram account they could think of, deleted anything past _October,_ and-

He looks down at his hands. Last night, after watching the air that had filled in the space where Sander had once stood for an unhealthy amount of time, he punched a tree. _Hard._ Causing scratches that would have taken weeks to heal, blood that would’ve still been drying on his skin, pain that he couldn’t feel any more of last night, but by now should’ve kicked in.

Nothing. Plain, clear nothing.

Robbe looks outside. The trees have leaves. Leaves that are red, orange, and yellow. Leaves that swoop off of their branches and float towards the ground, swaying in the breeze like little dancers in brightly coloured costumes, the kind that were in reality shows that Robbe’s mother used to watch when he was a child.

Well, he’s definitely not a child anymore. And he’s definitely not floating towards the sidewalk, either. He’s falling, face-first, and _hard._

_Holy shit. It’s fucking October._

~~~

**From: Jens**

Sorry about Noor bro:(

**From: Aaron**

Gfs suck anyways man, better to be free

**From: Moyo**

thats true

we’ll find you someone new robbe

**From: Aaron**

Yes we will

You still up to go to the party tonight?

Robbe?

~~~

_The house is crowded. The music is so loud it’s painful. And Robbe is drunk. Very, very drunk._

_He doesn’t want to look at Noor’s worried glances from across the room. He wishes that he hadn’t told her about him. He wishes that he could have just held on for a little while longer and eventually found some shitty lie to break up with her for. He wishes that she had been so hurt that she would stalk over to him and throw her drink in his face and yell at him until he could find a breath in her angry monologue to run away. Because that’s what he does best. But Noor was understanding, and Noor was kind, and Noor’s heart was breaking but she still hugged Robbe and made him promise to call her if he needed anything._

_Robbe needs a lot of things. But Noor can’t give them to him._

_He figures that it must have been around one in the morning when he realizes that he can’t find the boys anywhere. The last time he had seen them had been in the kitchen, when they were neck-deep in a competition to see who could take the most shots, which Jens was winning by far._

_It’s okay, though. Robbe is totally, perfectly, one hundred percent okay with being alone. Being alone is great, actually. It’s amazing._

_Robbe slides down to the floor with his back against the living room wall. He’s a fucking liar. This sucks._

_Sneakers and high heels and dress shoes jump up and down to the beat of the pounding bass, but Robbe doesn’t see them. He only sees their movement, the waves they make in the choking air, their never-ending arc of up and down, up and down, up and-_

_“Hey man, are you okay?”_

_Robbe doesn’t want to look up. He doesn’t want someone’s pity, or worse, their pride when they peel poor, drunk Robbe off the sweaty floor and congratulate themselves on their good deed for the day. But if he’s being honest, he really doesn’t know if he can get up by himself, so he lifts his eyes and. Well. Fuck._

_It’s Sander Driesen. Of course it is._

_“Aren’t you that art kid? The really, really cool one?” The words are out before he can stop them and Robbe wants to kick himself. Sander is a lot more than ‘that art kid.’ Sander is beautiful, and talented, and did he mention beautiful, and a lot of other things that Robbe can’t think about right now. However, he can think about the, at minimum, four girls and two guys that he’s talked to in the past month that have said they would give their left arm to just hold Sander’s hand, even only for a minute. And they’re in fucking college._

_He’s definitely not joining those numbers. No way._

_“Sure,” Sander shrugs. He moves to sit down next to Robbe. “If that’s what you want me to be.” Robbe thinks that that could’ve been taken in many different ways, but all he’s getting is exhaustion. Sander seems limp, a stark contrast to the bright, warm vibes he’s always giving off._

_Not that Robbe’s ever noticed them. Or anything._

_“You have nice hair,” Robbe blurts. He reaches out and touches it. Just a little bit. It’s really nice. The white bleach seems to be shining neon shades of blue, and green, and purple, and red, each one individually, and then all at the same time, a collage that should give him a headache, but it doesn’t. It doesn’t._

_“Thanks,” Sander says. And then, nothing. They sit and watch the waves, watch the monster, watch the air bend, and bend, and bend, until everything is hazy and blurry and Robbe doesn’t even think he belongs on this planet._

_“I should go,” Sander says suddenly. He stands up, and Robbe wants to yell at him to come back, stay for another minute, because if he doesn’t, Robbe might float away and never fall back down. “See you around, Robbe.”_

_“Bye,” Robbe says, but Sander is already gone. The only thing that he left behind is the collage of colours that dance on the wall instead of silver smiles. And a piece of white paper on the ground that Robbe thinks is some sort of receipt, until he picks it up and sees numbers written in neat, perfect handwriting with a smiley face drawn at the end._

_Robbe retracts his earlier statement. Sander can have his left arm. And whatever else he wants._

~~~

Robbe knows exactly what party he’s going to. He knows who’s going to be there, he knows what music they’re going to play, he knows what sad, sad eyes are going to stare at him from across the floor. The only thing that he doesn’t know is _why the fuck_ it’s all happening.

“Drink, man,” Jens says. Robbe looks over. He’s offering a red cup with something clear in it. “You look like you’re in pain.”

“That’s because he is,” Moyo says. “Heartbreak.”

_Sander isn’t stopping. He’s walking away, and he isn’t stopping._

“Yeah,” Aaron agrees, but he’s watching Amber dance from across the room. “Heartbreak.”

Moyo slaps Aaron in the side of the head. “You’re useless, you know?”

“Yeah,” Aaron says again.

Robbe drinks.

It doesn’t do anything. Whatever was in the cup only makes the music louder, and the Sander-sized hole in his heart grow bigger. If that was even possible.

_What if he knows? What if he remembers everything?_

_What if he doesn’t?_

Robbe thinks that that might be the worst thing of all. Because is all of this is really happening, and it’s not just some sort of weird dream, then he and Sander _really_ dated, and then they _really_ broke up, and then they _really_ went back in fucking time. And Robbe remembers it all.

He doesn’t know what he’ll do if Sander doesn’t recognize him. And he definitely doesn’t know what he’ll do if Sander looks at him with the same face as he did last night-

_Anger, hurt, disappointment._

-the one that’s practically engraved into the back of his eyelids.

Robbe’s stomach twists. He never wants to see Sander look like that again.

More and more people pour in through the doors of the house, squeezing into the rooms and occupying space like molecules pushing against the walls of a balloon. Robbe knows that he’s here _somewhere,_ he has to be, but he’s trying not to look for him, because _what if it screws everything up?_

It doesn’t matter though. Because when he finally finds Sander, Sander is already staring at him.

He’s surrounded by beautiful people, people like Noor, who belong on the cover of some glossy indie magazine that only truly cool teenagers can buy without looking like they’re trying too hard. And they’re all smiling, and laughing, and waiting for Sander to pay attention to them, but Sander is looking straight into _Robbe’s_ eyes, with this little smile that twists Robbe’s heart into a million different shapes.

This is _not_ how it happened the first time.

For a split second, Robbe is comforted by that fact. But then Sander’s eyes flick away from his face, and he continues on with his conversation like he hadn’t just imploded Robbe’s world. And there’s no recognition, no move to come get Robbe, nothing.

_Sander doesn’t remember him._

“Robbe. _Robbe._ Earth to Robbe.” Jens is waving a hand in front of his face. Robbe blinks. “Why are you staring at Sander Driesen?”

Oh, fuck. _Oh, fuck._ The nauseous feeling in Robbe’s stomach intensifies. He’s not out. He’s not out to Jens, or Milan, or Zoe, or even Sander- although Sander never needed to be told. The only one that knows is Noor. Or at least, he assumes Noor knows. The Noor in the Other Universe did at this point. Everything _seems_ the same, but who knows? Robbe certainly doesn’t.

It would be easy to tell them. It was only a few days ago that Aaron was asking about Sander, and Moyo was saying for the third time that week that he really loved Sander’s hair. It’s not a big deal anymore, just another thing that made up the long list of Robbe.

But he panics.

“I wasn’t staring at him.”

“Yeah, you kinda were.”

“Didn’t he and his girlfriend break up a couple weeks ago?” Robbe asks, and immediately wishes he could take it back. Is he supposed to know that yet?

“Yeah, apparently she broke up with him because he went all crazy on her,” Moyo says. “You’re not thinking of going for her, are you?”

_“No.”_

“Because I’m pretty sure the last time someone tried to hit on Britt, Sander dragged them into a bathroom, and they were _never seen again.”_ Moyo pauses. Dramatically. “Or, maybe it was just a couple hours later. And they were fine. But still. You could die.”

“Dude. That is such bullshit,” Jens snorts. “Are you fucking serious?”

“Just looking out for Robbe, man.”

The boys continue to argue, but their voices slip out of the edges of Robbe’s conscious. He’s scanning the room for Sander again, and _there he is,_ dancing in a sea of people, laughing with his head thrown back in ecstasy. Not looking at Robbe. Not remembering the stupid boy with the broken heart staring at him through the flashing lights.

There is no _way_ that Robbe can do all this another time. He’s can’t stand by and flirt with Sander, come out to the boys, hurt everyone that he possibly can, get his heart broken and fixed, all in the same sentence, and a million more things, because this time, he knows how it ends. It ends with Sander walking away from Robbe on a freezing February night, and it ends with Robbe alone, _again._

Will Sander love him in this universe? Will he even _like_ him?

Robbe is moving towards the door. The boys don’t even notice he’s gone. He’s pushing through pulsing music and sweaty college students and emotions that he thought he had put away _months_ ago, but apparently not, because Robbe literally _travelled back in fucking time._

“Hey man, are you okay?”

Robbe knows it’s Sander before he even looks up.

“I’m fine,” Robbe mutters, trying to push past him. _Fine, fine, Robbe is everything but fine._

Sander touches Robbe’s shoulder gently, and his entire arm is on _fire._ Fire, and ice, and anger, and fear, and love.

“You were staring at me,” Sander says. “Why were you staring at me?”

He can’t let him know. Robbe can’t be the who he was yesterday, the real Robbe. The free one, the brave one, the one that he actually was getting to _like_ , because Sander will wonder why some strange boy he’s never met before is telling him all about first dates, and soft kisses, and angry fights, and _fucking time travel._ None of that exists for Sander. _Robbe_ doesn’t exist for Sander. But Sander exists for Robbe.

“I wasn’t staring at you,” Robbe says. “You were staring at me.” How did he do this the last time? What did he say to make Sander leave that white piece of paper on the ground next to his shoe? And why can’t he do it again?

“Maybe,” says Sander. “But only because you were _looking_ for me.” He’s smiling like this is some sort of game, a tug-of-war in which Robbe is the one left falling face-first in the mud when Sander lets go. Because for Sander, it truly is just a game right now. One that Robbe doesn’t want to play.

“I wasn’t looking for you,” he says. He’s lying, and he’s putting on an act, and this is the Old Robbe, the one he hates so much. It’s too easy to slip back into his skin. Way too easy.

“Yes, you were,”

“No, I wasn’t.”

“Whatever you say,” Sander grins. He’s so beautiful, and Robbe is in love with him, and Sander doesn’t even know his name. It _hurts._

“I _wasn’t,”_ Robbe repeats. He pushes Sander’s hand off his shoulder, and he’s mad. Mad because Sander broke up with him, mad because Sander is supposed to love him, mad because Sander used to watch him with these eyes that looked at him like he was the most important thing in the entire universe, but now, all that’s left is mild curiosity and amusement. “Why the fuck would I be looking at you?”

Robbe can _see_ Sander’s face close off, and it’s really, _really_ similar to the Other Sander’s face, the one that broke up with Robbe twenty-four hours ago. He wants to cry, because he’s fucked it all up, _again,_ and five months early, too. Sander gazes at him for what feels ages, but then he turns and melts into the crowd, his white hair burning with colour as he disappears from sight.

_But it’s too late. Because Sander is gone. And Robbe is frozen._

~~~

Robbe comes up with his brilliant idea sometime between the hours of four and six in the morning, when the sun is just trying to break out of the horizon and jump into the city sky, and the smoke he is blowing out his bedroom window could be mistaken for icy clouds in morning air.

Everything that he thought earlier was bullshit. Absolute bullshit. He _can_ go through all of it again. He has to. And he’s not going to change a thing. Last night was a minor setback, yes. But he can fix it, he knows he can, he _has_ to. Robbe will do everything again, right down to the minute. He’ll fall in love with Sander, he’ll call him disgusting names, he’ll apologize and beg for forgiveness. Robbe will hurt Milan, get beat up in an alley, let Sander kiss his ex-girlfriend, take Sander back, do the hotel, the ambulance, the room full of drawings all over again. He’ll come out to the boys, and smile, and laugh, and feel _accepted._

And finally, he’ll stand by and let everything fall apart, just as he did the last time. Robbe will let the world crumble around him until Sander gets sick of it, which he inevitably will. And then it will all be over.

Robbe breathes in deeply. The smoke burns his throat, but he can barely feel it. It’ll all be worth it. Everything will be worth it, because he’ll get to be Sander’s world again. He’ll hurt Sander, and Sander will hurt him. But Sander will love him too, and that overrides everything.

_Will he though?_

That’s one of a million problems that Robbe has right now. Whatever happened to the folds of space and time on a cold night in February, it sent Robbe hurtling back five months into the past. But did it really? Is he living in the past, or is he living in a completely different universe?

And if he _is_ in a completely different universe, shouldn’t that mean they are at least s _ome_ differences? He was shocked enough the first time that Sander wanted to be with him. It was like someone had floated down from the heavens, handed Robbe this amazing gift, and told him that he could keep it, all for himself. Robbe doesn’t know if he’s lucky enough to have it happen again.

It’s too much for one morning. It’s too much for one person. And yet, Robbe doesn’t have much of a choice in that.

He sighs, leaning against the cool material of his window frame. The city awakens below him, and he wishes more than anything that he was back in the Other Universe, because even though everything was broken, at least he knew who he was. Here, he knows nothing.

‘In every universe’ is a lot less certain when there really is more than one. 

~~~

_Sander is an artist. Everyone knows that. But he takes pictures too, beautiful ones, ones that Robbe only gets to catch glimpses of as Sander slips them into a notebook, a drawer, an album._

_Whenever Robbe asks if he can see them, the answer is always the same. “One day,” Sander says quietly, and then he changes the topic so fast that Robbe’s head spins._

_“He never shows anyone his pictures,” Amber says to him one day, after he finally built up the nerve to ask her. “They’re private. He doesn’t think he’s very good, so he won’t let anyone look at them. I’ve been asking for years, and it still hasn’t worked yet.”_

_Robbe drops it. He never asks about the photos again, and Sander never offers._

_He wishes that he had asked. He wishes that he had said so much more than he did._

~~~

The skate park is almost empty. Most people are in class on Tuesday afternoon, and the ones who aren’t usually wouldn’t be outside when the sky is grey and clouding over, rain hovering in buckets over their heads, just waiting to spill over.

Sander isn’t most people, though.

Robbe is practically praying that this Sander is sitting on the edges of the forest with his camera against his eye and his sketchbook open beside him, just like the Other Sander did every Tuesday afternoon, no matter what. Sander always said it was one of his favourite places on campus, because he could be a part of two worlds at the same time- the world of the living, with people doing tricks on their skateboards, laughing when they messed up; and the world of the forest, quiet, calm, simple yet so complex. Sometimes Robbe went with him, sometimes he didn’t. Most of the time, it was the latter. He’s really kicking himself for that now.

When the hill separating the skate park and the forest gives way to flat ground, Robbe can literally feel the relief wash over him at the sight of a black leather jacket and a camera that’s pointed straight at him. The emotion is palpable, and Robbe wants to dig his fingers into it and never let go.

“Hi,” he says, once he’s close enough for Sander to hear him. The camera has been moved to sit on Sander’s legs, screen completely blank. Just like the expression on his face. “Can I sit?”

Sander doesn’t say yes, but he doesn’t say no either, so Robbe counts it as a win.

If someone were to take a photo of this moment, Robbe would be acutely aware of every single detail in it- the rough bark catching against the back of his jacket; the way Sander’s hair ruffles _just_ the slightest bit in the wind; their hands only inches apart on the soft grass. The space feels like miles. But Robbe doesn’t move, doesn’t speak, because he _knows_ Sander, in a way that no one else does. He knows that if someone sits quietly with him for just a moment too long, Sander will pour his entire heart into their hands without holding back, because all he’s ever wanted is to not be _alone._

_“I always thought you were so happy,” Robbe whispers into his neck. There’s a clock ticking softly in the background, marching to the beat of Robbe’s heart that has inexplicitly, perfectly lined up with Sander’s. “You had all these friends, everyone knew your name, everyone wanted to talk to you, and- and you just smiled through it all, like it was no big deal.”_

_There’s a long pause. Sander’s fingers are running through his hair, touching the cool chain around his collar, drawing pictures on his skin. Robbe is a statue made of terror and tenderness, warmth and frost. This moment exists in a place where nothing else does, and Robbe wants to tuck it behind the walls of his heart, so that no one can ever damage it._

_“I was so lonely,” Sander finally says, although it’s more to himself than Robbe. “I think I was lonelier than any other time in my entire life.”_

_Robbe wants to forget that he ever heard that, but he can’t, so he hugs Sander even tighter than before. They’ve somehow melted into one being, taking up one place in the universe. “I know,” Robbe murmurs, letting his words get brushed away into the atmosphere by their synchronized breathing. “I know that now.”_

_He thinks Sander might be crying, but it’s safe in the soft darkness, so Robbe reaches his heart out and_ feels, _more than anything he’s ever felt before._

_Sander does the same. And for a singular moment, it’s perfection in a world of anything but._

“I come here every Tuesday.” Sander starts. The Other Universe evaporates. “It’s nice. Peaceful.” Sander pauses, and his eyes dart toward Robbe. “Usually.”

“Sorry.”

The corners of Sander’s lips are turned upwards, and Robbe _soars._

“And sorry about the party,” Robbe blurts out before he can stop himself. “I didn’t mean to be a dick.”

Sander considers him for a moment. “So you _were_ looking at me,” he says, and Robbe can feel himself grinning, because _this is how it’s supposed to be._

“A little bit.”

“Sander,” he says, holding out a hand.

_I know,_ he screams. _I know you are. I know you._

But he can’t know Sander. Not yet. Not in this universe.

“Robbe,” he says, and shakes his hand. His palm burns.

“Cool.” Sander is fully smiling now, his real smile.

“Cool.”

~~~

Sander leaves his number on a white piece of paper next to Robbe’s shoe.

Robbe stares at the paper for a long, long time after Sander leaves. Long enough that it starts to rain, and he has to pick it up and shove it in his pocket before the ink bleeds and the numbers become illegible. Not that it would matter anyways. Robbe has had Sander’s number memorized for five months.

~~~

“Who’re you texting?” Milan asks.

“No one.” Robbe slams his phone onto the couch so fast that he’s surprised he hasn’t made a hole in the fabric. “Absolutely no one.”

“Yeah, I don’t really believe you, oddly enough.”

“Well, that’s strange, isn’t it?” Robbe tries his best to stare at literally anything else in the room besides Milan. He knows what’s coming, and he wants to prolong the _extremely_ uncomfortable conversation that he’s about to sit through.

“Hm.” Milan is staring right through him. “Is this about Noor?”

“No.”

“Another girl?”

“No.”

Pause. “A guy?”

_“No,_ Milan.”

“Just asking!”

Robbe huffs. “Why do you think that every single person you meet is gay? Straight people actually exist, you know.”

“Really? I had no idea,” Milan deadpans. “But really, it’s because I have an excellent gaydar.”

“Of course.”

“It’s true! Excellent track record too- 98% of the time, I’m right.”

Robbe rolls his eyes. He should be getting an Oscar for this performance. “Sure.”

Milan watches him for a long second. “And it’s not because of how they look, or how they act,” he says, softer this time. “It’s their eyes. There’s always something hiding inside of them. Something that just can’t come out.”

Robbe swallows. There’s so much hiding inside of him that he thinks he might choke on it. “That’s great, Milan,” he says, “but if you stare everyone down until you can figure out if they’re gay or not, you might end up with several restraining orders.”

“Shut up.” Milan throws a pillow at Robbe’s head. “But honestly. You can tell me anything, okay?”

Now, Robbe thinks that he should be getting another Oscar, but this time it’s for hiding the lump that’s building up in his throat and grinning when he speaks. “Thanks, but no thanks.”

Milan gives him this sad smile that makes his heart twist. “Okay, Robbe,” is all he says, and walks away.

Robbe lets himself feel bad for a minute. But then, he squashes it down, because _this is how it has to be,_ and he picks up his phone to text Sander back.

~~~

_Robbe surprises himself when he asks Sander out._

_Well, kind of. He asks Sander to hang out first, and even though it isn’t an “official” date, it’s pretty close. They drink cheap beer in Robbe’s empty apartment, and burn croques on the stove, and end up walking through this park near the college, watching the stars burn from millions of miles away._

_Sander isn’t exactly what Robbe expected. The Sander that Robbe had heard of was unapologetic, and resilient, and funny, but also harsh, and impulsive, and maybe even a little bit selfish._

_Some of it is true. Sander is impulsive, unapologetic and funny, but he’s also vulnerable, and caring, and more than the boy that everyone whispers and gawks at, like he’s one of his paintings, put on display for everyone to see._

_“I think, if I ever get reborn into another life, I want to be a star,” Sander says._

_“I don’t think that’s how it works.”_

_“Yes, it is.”_

_Robbe grins. “Okay.”_

_“Stars are fucking awesome,” says Sander. “I mean, they’re literal fire hanging in the sky, and they just get to watch everything that happens down here, without actually having to deal with any of this shit.”_

_The stars glitter approvingly. “That’s creepy,” Robbe says. “Why would you want to watch everything that happens down here?”_

_Sander shoves him. “Not_ everything, _Robbe.”_

_He laughs, and it feels really good. Almost as good as when Sander’s hand brushes against his, the smallest touch of skin._

_That makes something in his stomach hurt in a way that it’s never done before._

_They’ve been silent for a long time, when Robbe finally speaks again. “Would you get lonely?”_

_“As a star?”_

_“Yeah.”_

_Sander stops walking. “No,” he says. “No, I don’t think that I would.”_

_There’s more to that answer than Sander’s ready to share yet, but that’s okay. Robbe will wait. Robbe will wait until the planets collide, and the sun burns out, and Sander’s stars fall from the sky, because this boy is special, he’s something different, and Robbe wants to hold onto that for as long as he possibly can._

_Later that night, they’re standing outside of Robbe’s apartment building, grasping onto the last seconds of the night for as long as possible, when Sander reaches out and intertwines his fingers with Robbe’s. It creates an impossible puzzle, one that Robbe never wants to figure out. Some things are better left a mystery._

_“So. Tonight was fun.”_

_“It was okay.” Sander squeezes his hand, and Robbe’s heart stutters. “Fine, it was fun.”_

_“That’s right,” Sander says, and all of a sudden, their faces are really, really close, closer than they’ve ever been before. The stars seem brighter. Robbe can’t move._

_He wants to kiss Sander. So bad. But Sander is a boy, and Robbe is a boy, and they’re standing outside of an apartment building on a college campus in which it is very likely that someone he recognizes will walk by. One thing will lead to another, and another, and Robbe can’t kiss Sander right now, he wants to, but he just can’t._

_“Bye,” he says, pulling away. Their fingers catch, and Robbe has to force himself to let go. “I’ll text you tomorrow?”_

_“Sure,” says Sander. His voice is a little more muted than before. Robbe hates it. “Whatever you want.”_

_Robbe slams the door behind him before he can look back._

~~~

Their first not-date is almost the same as the Other Universe, minus a few key differences. 

In the park, as they’re talking about the lonely stars, Sander says something more. “No,” he had said in response to Robbe’s question. “No, I don’t think that I would.” But this time, after walking in silence for long, stretched-out minutes, Sander adds, “Nothing could be worse than here.”

_Nothing could be worse than here._

It’s whispered underneath his breath, so that Robbe has the choice to ignore it if he wants. But it confuses him, because Sander never said that in the Other Universe. And as much as he thinks about it, he’s almost 99 percent sure that he did everything else besides the party exactly the same.

_Why would it change?_

But Current Sander doesn’t know about the Other Sander or the Other Universe, or how Robbe is trying so hard to keep everything under control, so Robbe reaches out and takes his hand, letting himself change just one more thing. A smile threatens to break out on the corners of Sander’s lips, and they walk all the way back to Robbe’s apartment holding their impossible puzzle between their palms, which suddenly seems slightly _less_ impossible now.

Pulling away from Sander hurts more this time, too. Robbe had let them get so close, close enough that if anyone was watching from the outside, they would have said the two shadows standing in the moonlight were kissing. But he knows how he felt back then and how it affected the two them, and he can’t risk changing anything else.

Even though when Robbe watches Sander’s face close off, just a little bit, he wants to run in circles through time and yell at himself for letting this all happen. If only he had been a little less _stupid,_ and a little more brave, he wouldn’t of had to put himself or Sander through all of this. For the _second_ time.

But he’s Robbe, and of course he had to make it difficult.

In addition, the conversation that he has with Yasmina in biology class a few days later is even worse than he remembers. Now that he’s looking, Robbe can clearly see the hurt in her eyes, the exasperation that she feels when she realizes that he’s just like every other person that asks her exhausting questions that she gets tired of answering.

_I’m different,_ he thinks, as he’s walking out of class, getting lost in the crowds of students spreading out across campus. Yasmina usually walks with him as far as her dorm, but she disappeared as soon as the lecture ended, and Robbe feels worse than he did before. _I’m different now, I’m not who I was back then._

But is he really? Robbe’s just doing everything again, hurting the same people, making them deal with his insecurities, his anger, his ignorance- so is he really a different Robbe?

Maybe there is the Other Universe, and the Other Sander, and the Other Noor, and the Other Brroers. But there’s only one Robbe. And no matter how many universes he gets shoved in, he thinks that he’s going to fuck up every single one of them.

~~~

**From: Sander**

See you at 7!

Robbe is twenty minutes late. Because that’s how late he was the first time around.

It’s weird, though. The exact people that were walking down this street months ago are walking down the street today. Robbe dodges a rock lying on the sidewalk that he distinctly remembers, because he had been scared that he was going to run over it, get a flat tire, and be so late for the his second not-date with Sander, that Sander would just get up and leave and never talk to him again.

“Sorry, sorry,” Robbe blurts out as soon as he stops in front of the bar that they were supposed to meet at. Sander is leaning against the brick wall, smiling just the smallest bit, and Robbe loves this and hates it so _much._

“You’re late, Ijzermans,” Sander says. He gets onto his own bike and starts to pedal away. “Come on.”

“Aren’t we going inside?” Robbe yells. He lets himself smile at Sander’s retreating back. _They’re not going inside; they were never going inside._

“Come _on.”_

The night is so close to perfect. It’s almost exactly as Robbe remembers it. There’s the disgusting, cheap alcohol that he drinks anyway because it was Sander who bought them, and Sander touched Robbe’s hand when he passed it to him, which makes Robbe feel brave. There’s the long, white tunnel with its bright fluorescent lights that transport Robbe to another planet, one where he’s flying through a sea of luminescent joy, one where darkness, and ice, and freezing February nights are just a distant dream, being swept away on the wings of a warm fall breeze.

And then, there’s the pool.

The look in Sander’s eyes as he picks the lock hasn’t changed at all. The temperature of the water is still piercingly cold. The taste of chlorine, and gin, and _Sander_ mixes together in a way that Robbe had almost forgotten, and he hates himself for failing to remember the way that it all fits together, like the pieces of a puzzle slotting together, finally, _finally,_ making sense.

It’s so close to perfect. But it can’t be. Because as Sander kisses Robbe, and Robbe kisses Sander, and they stay wrapped together in a way that Robbe in every single universe had been dreaming about for years, Robbe in this universe has the tiny voice in the back of his mind that’s yelling at him, _screaming_ at him. Screaming that Sander might love him now, but he won’t in the end. Screaming that Robbe will push, and pull, and bend until Sander can’t take it anymore and everything will shatter into fragments of a glass heart.

He tries to ignore it. Tries to focus on that way that Sander kisses him, like he’s the only thing in the universe that matters. Tries to focus on the way that Sander pulls on his hair before pushing their mouths closer together, always closer. Tries to focus on the warmth that heats up his body, his mind, his _heart,_ in a way that no one else does.

But he can’t. Robbe knows how this finishes. It leaves a bitter taste in his mouth.

~~~

_He despises himself._

_It’s nothing new, exactly. But it’s especially strong tonight._

_He might not be dating Noor anymore, but it still feels awful. And shouldn’t kissing a boy feel incredible? This is what he’s been waiting for, but instead of the elation that was in the strange safety of the dark streets of Antwerp, all he can remember is the slurs that get thrown at the “gay kids,” the whispering when there’s something not quite “normal” about someone, the blatant laughter that gets heard from across classes, and dining halls, and parties._

_Robbe had always imagined that once he made it to college, he would be able to tell everyone without any issues, and everything would be perfect. Flip a switch, fix a boy._

_It’s definitely not like that. It’s worse._

_Because now, the boy that Robbe had imagined for years and years has literally just kissed him. And Robbe is drowning in his own mind, so deep that he can’t break the surface to realize that there’s someone there waiting just for him._

_But he won’t let himself take it._

~~~

He’s a mess.

He knows what he has to do. He can remember the crushing panic that came with seeing the ‘Sleep well?’ text with the emoji after it, because it meant that it was all real. All the secrets, all the lies, everything that he had hidden inside himself was about to burst out into the open, and he had been _so, so scared._

Now, instead of the crushing panic Robbe felt, it’s crushing dread that causes him to press down on the loud, red BLOCK button underneath Sander’s name. Dread, because if he doesn’t, things might never turn out the way they did in the Other Universe, and Robbe will lose Sander entirely, here and everywhere else.

Zoe comes in his bedroom while he’s still staring at the ceiling, refusing to check his phone. If he does, he might screw everything up and unblock Sander before he notices that anything is wrong. And then _everything_ would be wrong.

“Are you okay?” Zoe asks.

“Yes.” Zoe raises a perfect eyebrow. “Really.”

“Okay,” she says. “You want coffee?”

“Isn’t Senne on the couch?” Robbe asks.

“That’s the point,” Zoe mumbles. He can see the worry written into the lines on her face, and Robbe deflates. He’s been so caught up in his own problems, that he completely forgot about what Zoe and Senne have coming for them in the next months.

“I’m sorry,” Robbe says, and he’s apologizing for more than one thing.

“It’s whatever,” Zoe says. She looks at him warily, as if daring him to challenge her next words. “It’ll be okay in the end.”

_No, it won’t._

~~~

It’s the next day when Sander shows up at his apartment.

Robbe is coming back from class, music pulsing through his headphones, hoping that he can drown out the conversation that is about to come. But he can’t drown out Sander’s hand on his shoulder, or the movement of his lips, or the sinking of Robbe’s heart.

“Why did you block me?” Sander asks. He’s grinning, and Robbe is about to rip the smile off his face and squash it underneath the heel of his shoe.

“Leave me alone,” Robbe says. The words come out choked. Sander looks so confused, and Robbe repeats them again, harsher this time. _He doesn’t want to do this._

“I don’t understand, Robbe, what’s-”

“Don’t act like you don’t know,” he says. “You got me drunk, and then you-”

“I did _what now?”_

Okay, so that didn’t happen in the Other Universe. Sander’s brows are furrowed, and his fists are tightened, and Robbe is _this_ close to backing down, but he can’t, _he can’t._

“Just leave me alone,” Robbe snaps. Sander moves closer, reaching out for him, and he shoves him away, as hard as he can. “Don’t touch me.”

“Come on, Robbe-”

“Stay away from me!” He’s going to cry. He has to say it, he has to say it, he has to say it. “What’s the fuck is wrong with you? Fuck off, Sander.”

_He couldn’t say it._

He couldn’t say it. He almost did. The words were mean, and they were close. But he didn’t. Because he knows how that _one_ word affected Sander, he knows the memories associated with that word, he knows that this moment, right here, is the reason why sometimes, when Sander thought that Robbe was sleeping, he would stare at the back of his head and whisper how he still thinks about Robbe’s face when he said it. How he was scared that Robbe truly believed it.

Robbe can’t do that to him again.

And that changes everything.

~~~

_The first time that Noor and Robbe attempted to have sex, Robbe screwed everything up._

_“I’m sorry.”_

_“Robbe, it’s okay, you were nervous-”_

_“It’s not okay- fuck, it’s not okay!” Robbe pushes himself to the edge of the bed. There’s a storm coming, he can feel it, and he doesn’t think that he wants to deal with that right now. Maybe not now, maybe not ever._

_Noor is hugging him from behind, and Robbe leans into it, because even though Noor is a girl, she likes him, and she’ll stay with him, even when he can’t do anything right. “Is it because of me?” she asks. The question fills up the night sky, along with Robbe’s whispered answer._

_“No,” he says. He wants to believe it more than anything. “You’re amazing.” At least that part is true._

_But Noor is so smart, and insanely observant and she pulls away like Robbe is burning ice. “Robbe,” she says, so carefully. “What’s going on?”_

_“Nothing.”_

_“Tell me the truth.”_

_“It’s nothing!” It’s not nothing, it’s not, it’s not._

_“Please.”_

_Robbe cracks. Words spill out of him like water from a glass. All the thoughts, feelings, everything that he’s kept hidden under his many layers pour out, and he can’t stop. Somewhere in between explaining why he couldn’t tell the boys and apologizing over and over again, Noor starts crying. He tries to hug her, but his arms are shaking too much, and Noor just pushes him away anyway._

_“No, Robbe,” she says. “Not right now, okay?”_

_“Okay,” Robbe says. He’s crying too._

_“Why didn’t you tell me before?”_

_“I couldn’t.”_

_“Does anyone else know?”_

_“No.” Fuck no._

_“Okay.” Noor wipes her tears away, smiles at him as best as she can, and Robbe doesn’t know how she does it. She just got her heart broken by some naïve, stupid boy who thought that it would be fun to play with her feelings, and she’s somehow holding it all together._

_“I’m really, really sorry, Noor,” he says, and he doesn’t think he’s ever meant anything more in his entire life._

_“I know you are,” she says. “I know what it’s like to want to hide from the world. But it’s going to kill you Robbe, if you keep it inside.”_

_“I’ll be fine.”_

_Noor looks at him with those eyes that have always saw more than she said, and touches his shoulder gently. Robbe closes his eyes, and he wants her to keep her hand there for just a few moments longer. But her fingers brush off his skin, truly signifying their end._

_“I should go,” she whispers. “But- maybe not right away,_ but- _if you ever need me, you know my number.”_

_“I do.” He can barely hear the sound of his own voice._

_“Bye, Robbe,” Noor says, and she is gone, and Robbe is the worst person in the entire world. But then, the next day is the party, and Sander is there, and Robbe still might be the worst person in the entire world, but he’s the most hopeful too._

_The second time, it was a little different._

_It was after the underwater kiss with Sander, the one that left Robbe whole and broken at the same time. It was after Sander had came to his door, asking why Robbe blocked him, with the barest hint of hope in his eyes, as if it all had been some sort of funny joke of which he missed the punchline. It was after Robbe had thrown the worst words in his face, the words he knew would hurt the most, and watched as everything that Sander had wished for was sucked away and shoved into a tiny, locked box in the back of his memories._

_None of this had ever been a problem with Noor. Kissing Noor never felt like that. Kissing Noor might have made him feel nothing, but isn’t nothing better than everything hitting him square in the chest and knocking him flat on his back?_

_So Robbe calls her. Lets her know that he really needs to talk to her, asks how soon she can come over. And when she answers, “Right away,” Robbe’s heart twists so violently that he thinks he might be sick._

_As soon as Noor walks through the door into his room, Robbe tells her. “I was wrong,” he says. Liar, liar, liar. “I’m not… I’m not that. I love you, I know I do.”_

_She doesn’t believe him, and Robbe can see it written clearly on her face. “Robbe…”_

_“Can I kiss you?” he asks, and he’s practically pleading for it, because he wants to be normal again, just for a minute._

_“No, Robbe,” Noor says gently. “You don’t love me. Not like that.”_

_“Why does everyone keep telling me how to feel?” Robbe says. There’s something in him snapping. “I don’t need it! I know how I fucking feel!”_

_Noor reaches out and grabs his hands from where they had been grasping at the roots of his hair. “It’s okay, Robbe, it’s okay,” she repeats, over and over._

_“We could try again,” Robbe says. “I mean, we’re right here, I know what’s happening now, I won’t be nervous this time-”_

_“No.” She’s rubbing her thumbs along the back of his hands. Somehow, they ended up sitting on Robbe’s messily made bed. He wishes he had tried harder. “You’re going to figure it out, alright? Maybe not today, and definitely not with me. But you will.”_

_“What if I don’t?”_

_“I promise you will.” Noor hugs him, and it feels so, so good. Robbe just wants someone to care about him, someone to love him, the way that Noor did, the way that Noor_ does.

_And he wants to love them back._

_But he can’t have that-_

Underwater kisses, white hair, fluorescent lights.

_-right now. So he settles for lying in Noor’s arms, and smelling her rose perfume, and listening to her tell him that everything is going to be just fine. When he closes his eyes, he can almost believe her._

_In the morning, though, Noor is gone._

_She was way too good for him anyway._

~~~

Robbe slams his door so hard that he’s surprised it doesn’t come flying off the hinges.

He’s really fucked it all up now.

“Robbe?” Milan is calling out to him, and Robbe cannot do this right now.

“Fuck off, Milan!” he yells. He punches his pillow once, twice, and hugs it to his chest, trying to protect his lungs from the pressure of everything building up on top of them.

Milan is right next to his door now. “You can-”

“Leave me _alone,”_ he practically screams. But something has changed from the Other Universe- whether it’s the desperation in his throat that is threatening to suffocate him, or the way Robbe’s voice cracks on the last word- and Milan doesn’t listen to a thing he says.

“Why doesn’t anyone understand what ‘fuck off’ means,” Robbe mumbles as Milan opens his door. He raises an eyebrow.

“Maybe because it’s not a very nice way of saying ‘hey friend, something’s bothering me, why don’t we talk about it?’”

Robbe rolls his eyes. “Nothing’s bothering me, okay?”

Milan scoffs. “I wouldn’t even try that one.”

“ _Fine._ How about, it’s none of your fucking business?”

“Rude, but better.” Milan reaches for the pillow and pries into out from his bloodless hands. “You ready to tell me what all this is about? Or _who?”_

Robbe watches a bird fly by outside his window.

“Ohhhhhh,” Milan grins. “If you won’t answer, it must be about _me,_ then. I’m really sorry, Robbe, but I’m just not interested you like that and-”

Robbe groans. “I hate you.”

“No, you don’t.” There’s a long pause. “So? Who are they?”

_Sander stares at him. Robbe’s heart is leaping in his chest, both in relief and disappointed. He still is an asshole, but at least he didn’t go there._

_“I don’t know what happened to you,” Sander starts, and oh no, this is really not how it’s supposed to go, what has Robbe done? Now is the part where Robbe is supposed to walk away, and leave Sander standing alone on the doorstep in disbelief. “But next time you decide that you want to kiss some guy for fun in a pool in the middle of the night- make sure that you make it clear you’re not actually into him. Because he might have feelings too.”_

_Robbe feels disgusting. “Sander, wait-”_

_But Sander is giving him that look that Robbe remembers all too well, the one from the night that they broke up, the one that Robbe never wanted to see again. The words turn to ash in Robbe’s mouth. “I’m sorry,” he says. “Sorry, okay?”_

_“Whatever,” Sander says. He looks like he is trying not to crack the mask that he has inserted tightly back into place, screwing the edges into his skin in a gruesome way of hiding himself. “When you figure out what you want, let me know.”_

_“Sander.”_

_“Bye, Robbe.”_

Robbe has done something completely, irreversibly wrong. There’s no going back on this one. The Other Universe, the Other Sander, the Other Anything- none of that can save him now.

He’s all alone.

“Hello?” Milan snaps his fingers in front of Robbe’s face. “Well? Who are they?”

_“Sander,”_ Robbe says. His heart is a feather and a stone, all at the same time.

“Driesen?” Milan asks. “What about him?” Robbe stares at him for a minute, a year, a century. Finally, something clicks. _“Oh fuck.”_

“Yeah.”

Milan grabs his hand. “Were you really that scared to tell me about a boy? Honestly, Robbe, what did you _think_ I was going to say?”

“I don’t know,” Robbe says, because he really doesn’t, not anymore.

“Also, _Sander Driesen?_ I’m _impressed,_ Robbe, how did you manage that?”

There’s a sick, churning feeling in his stomach. “I don’t know,” he says again.

Milan draws his eyebrows in. “Why do you look so sad?”

“Because I fucked everything up,” Robbe snaps. “Okay? It doesn’t matter anymore. I screwed _everything_ up, and Sander- he’s really mad.”

“Do I want to know what you did?”

“No.”

“Okay.” Milan sighs. “Look. Do you like him? _Really_ like him?”

_Robbe loves Sander. He loves him in a way that he’s never loved anyone before, in a way that terrifies him from the core of his soul, in a way that hurts and heals simultaneously._

“I think so.”

“Then it’ll all be okay. I promise.” Robbe wants to believe him with every cell in his body. “The universe has a strange way of working out in a way that we don’t expect.”

Well, Robbe could’ve told himself _that_ one.

Milan ruffles his hair. “Go fix it, Robbe. If he really is that important to you, you can fix it.”

“Okay,” is what Robbe says.

_This is the most important thing in the world to me,_ is what Robbe thinks. _But I’ll never be able to fix it. Because in just a few short months, it’ll all be over again. And I don’t know if it’ll end the same way, or if I’ll get flung back in time again, or if I’ll screw everything up even worse this time._

_I just don’t know._

~~~

Robbe’s knuckles are turning red.

The door swings open, and his hand freezes in the air, inches away from an extremely surprised face. “What the fuck,” Sander states.

“Hi,” Robbe says. Or, kind of says. He might’ve ran the whole way here, because he was in such a hurry to see Sander that he literally couldn’t remember his code for the lock to his bike, and he wasn’t about to call Jens and ask. “Please don’t close the door.”

“I’m going to close the door,” Sander contradicts, but he doesn’t.

“I’m sorry,” Robbe says. “I’m really, really sorry. I was scared, and I took it out on you- and I’m sorry.”

Sander frowns. “Scared of what?”

_Of disappointed eyes. Of icy nights that tell him that he will never be warm again. Of making the same mistakes again, or making even worse ones. Of love, hate, and everything in between._

“You,” Robbe answers, because that’s as close to the truth as he can tell. “Me. Everything. The whole fucking universe.”

“Most people are,” Sander says. “That doesn’t change a whole lot.”

“I know- I _know that.”_ There’s no little smile on Sander face, but there is a string of fear threading its way through Robbe’s heart. _What if this is it, what if it all ends now?_

That wasn’t something that Robbe had considered. He thought that he would get the whole five months again, nothing more, nothing less. But he’s so far away from his path in the Other Universe, that he can’t even count on that anymore.

“Sander, truly, I’ve- I’ve never felt anything like this. Ever.” That’s true. He never has, and Robbe doesn’t think he ever will. “And I’m so, so sorry.” There’s a note of desperation in his voice and he tries to squash it down as fast as he can. “Please, just give me one more chance. One more.”

Sander looks at him for a long, long time.

And then he closes the door in his face.

_The line between this Universe and the Other Universe blurs. The warm air of Sander’s apartment building is mixed with winter wind, making every single breath hurt. Robbe can’t tell if the pressure in his head is from his face being pressed against the desk in his room for hours and hours, watching blankly as the February sun climbs the clouds, or if it’s from the feeling of his forehead touching the cracked, rough surface of the wood that separates him and Sander._

_Not yet,_ Robbe thinks. _Not just yet._

Sander swears softly from behind the door and before Robbe can react, he’s falling forwards into open space, and then into a tight hug. Robbe grabs onto the fabric of Sander’s hoodie like it’s the only thing grounding him to this universe- and really, it is. They’re pressed so close that they fuse into one human, and Robbe can’t tell where he begins and Sander ends. He thinks that if he listened close enough, he could hear their hearts beat in almost-perfect timing together; Sander’s just a split-second behind Robbe’s.

“I’m sorry,” Sander whispers into Robbe’s hair. “I’m sorry.”

Robbe tries to memorize every single point where their skin is touching. “Me too,” he says, but really, all he’s wants to tell Sander is _please don’t let go._

Maybe Sander can hear him, somewhere inside of his layered mind, full of puzzles and enigmas that no one could even began to make sense of, because he grips Robbe a little tighter than before.

And he doesn’t let go.

_For now._

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! i hope you liked it:)
> 
> join me on tumblr @colourbyletter


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